him with her. Other things more compelling had evidently crowded it
from memory.

"I had never seen her until the night I saw her here. She, I learned
later, knew me, however, as Harrie's brother. I had been told that
Harrie was infatuated with her, and, knowing there could only be
disaster unless the thing was stopped, I went to see the girl. The
evening you saw me was the second time I had seen her. I was trying
to make her promise to go away. This isn't her home. She came here
to get work."

Selwyn leaned back against the sofa, and his eyes looked into mine
with helpless questioning. "I've been brought in contact
professionally with many types of human beings, but that girl is the
most baffling thing I've come across yet. I can't make her out. The
night after I saw her here I went to see her at what, I supposed, was
her home, just opposite the Hadley box-factory. Later she told me
she didn't live there, and would not say where she lived. All the
time I talked to her her eyes were on her hands in her lap and,
though occasionally her lips would twist, she would say nothing. It
isn't a pleasant thing for a man to tell a girl his brother isn't a
safe person for her to go with, isn't one to be trusted, but I did
tell her. She's an odd little thing, all fire and flame, and to talk
frankly was to be brutal, but some day she should thank me. She
won't do it. She will hate me always for warning her. She knew as
well as I that marriage was out of the question, and yet she would
not promise to give Harrie up. When you saw me I was on my way for a
second talk with her. Meeting her on the street, I did not go to the
house, which she said she had just left, and as she would not tell me
where she was going, I had to do my talking as we walked."